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Greenlee: Is it really over?

By Bob Greenlee

Posted:
08/14/2011 01:00:00 AM MDT

According to a recent city initiated survey, 71 percent of Boulder residents support a ballot initiative to give Xcel Energy the heave-ho and have the city condemn and take over providing local electric service. So why even bother putting the actual ballot language up for a vote? Is it over? Do people really want local politicians, bureaucrats, and environmental activists to have the power over our power? What's the matter with those 29 percent who might be skeptical of the upcoming scheme? The cost? What cost?

The survey was conducted before any of the respondents ever actually read the ballot language that would impose this unprecedented change. But former U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi once claimed legislators would love Obamacare once the politicians passed the thing and then later had time to read what was actually in the bill.

What voters are being asked to do this November isn't all that easy to explain. The primary purpose of the vote may just be to tell Xcel to take a permanent hike. That's because city council never even considered any alternatives to its nearly preordained municipalization plan. If the theoretical purpose behind the scheme was to reduce the city's "carbon footprint," what alternative opportunities to achieve that goal were ever considered? Would spending more money to increase community mobility have achieved most or part of the goal? Would a variety of locally initiated sustainability projects have helped achieve the objective? Why weren't any number of other opportunities to reduce carbon emissions even considered?

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The real unanswered question is this: When voters rejected renewing a 20-year franchise agreement with Xcel did that also mean they wanted to write a blank check to council to do anything and everything possible to toss them out? Or were they just rejecting an inflexible 20-year agreement? Council has done a totally inadequate job of considering any alternatives. That's one of the major reasons voters might consider rejecting the current municipalization scheme. Doing so would open up new opportunities for alternatives that have been left entirely unexplored.

The citizen survey gave high marks to Xcel for providing reliable service and stable energy bills. The issue of reliability has come up before especially in the context of the city's desire to employ more on "renewable" sources of energy production-like wind and solar. Unfortunately, wind and solar are currently among the most unreliable sources of energy. Reliability, however, should not be an issue because the federal government sets strict electric reliability standards. Anyone who hooks onto the grid system must adhere to those standards. When it comes to electric energy rates, however, that's where things get dicey.

Should Boulder decide to condemn and commandeer Xcel's local assets, city council will replace Colorado's somewhat useless Public Utilities Commission with some kind of new oversight. There's no end to the possible mischief one will encounter if this occurs. Ratepayers should be concerned about any additional social engineering that might be attempted with this kind of new rate-setting authority. It is this fundamental issue of governance along with how those who will end up paying most of the costs of the muni-scheme that concerns many in the local business community.

As I have pointed out before, nearly 82 percent of the current estimated Xcel electric revenues in Boulder come from the commercial and industrial users. Only 18 percent of electric revenue comes from residential customers. Will that considerable differential on who actually pays the bills also allow for disproportionate representation in any "citizens" rate setting committee? Of course not.

Perhaps the most disagreeable part of this whole plan is that the city also wants to tax and spend around $12 million to hire engineers and expensive attorneys to go forward. That's real money that could otherwise be spent on other community needs. What new assets will be left unfunded if the city ends up wasting every dime on its muni-scheme?

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